The Case for Religious Profiling

The Western world is in immense danger. It is not paranoia and it is not conservative propaganda to assume that an Islamic terrorist attack on a major Western city is imminent at any time in the near future. Iran has elected a more brutal political leader than ever, proving that democracy does not ensure security. North Korea has learned well that it can get away with anything and still receive piles of undeserved aid to prevent the famine and instability made inevitable by its political system. The goal of Western soldiers abroad has stopped being the security of American interests and turned into a crusade to impress a caricature of Western values onto a culture incapable of incorporating those values. In the four years since thousands of Americans were killed by Islamic terrorists in New York, we've yet to end the very governments and states which made those terrorists possible, and we seem to have forgotten the difference between us and them.

The Western world is rationally and measurably superior to all other cultures. This is because the West innovated the concepts of personal liberty and capitalism. These two political-social concepts have resulted in all of the major technological advancements in the world today. Many ideas and inspirations for technological development were taken from the traveling and conquering done by Western explorers over the centuries. But without the personal liberty to engage in any career or research activity one desired, and without a selfish benefit to the person researching the innovation, it would never see its full development or mass distribution.

Personal liberty means the ability to choose ones career, daily routine, social activities, aesthetic affectations and creation and disposal of wealth without extrapersonal interference. This requires a legal framework which places the freedom of the individual above the goals and aspirations of social leaders. Whilst no Western government ever perfected it, the United States made the first bold attempt, and most Western governments have since mimicked her model, in addition to numerous other prosperous countries across the globe.

Capitalism means the execution of all trade in absence of physical coercion. Whilst the West was the largest imperial power to conquer much of the territory of the world, imperialism was not a method of land acquisition, but of political settlement, and most of the economic activity undertaken by Western traders in imperial territory was done to the betterment (if not for the betterment) of local landlords and laborers. Western control of imperial territories did not guarantee land for all white comers, but guaranteed a political and legal stabilization of a foreign land which allowed capitalist trade to commence, without the threats present in regions governed by indigenous authorities (such as ineffective court systems to enforce contracts or an unjust or arbitrary economic system which threatened the durability or sanctity of property or profits). When politics or homeland economics warranted the withdrawal of a Western authority from its overseas department, and that department reverted to indigenous rule not modeled on personal liberty and capitalism, most trade ceased and never returned (much of Africa is a case in point).

These are the superior values for which Western nations and their citizens are hated by the Islamic world. Don't be misled by assuming that other cultures have created advanced civilization and prosperity without these values: it has never happened. Imperial China, Soviet Russia, Ancient America and other oft-cited examples of non-Western advancement are a veneer to hide the slave states and mass mortality which the common people experienced. Any privileged upper class can mimic the prosperity of capitalism when supplied with enough slaves. Modern Asian nations have implemented Western values from top to bottom, including China, whose "authoritarian" government only has the power to spend tax revenues, and both power and taxes would evaporate if anything but the status quo were followed. The fact that modern Asia is an extension of the Western world today is why Islamic terrorists hate them too, thus the poorly-publicized epidemic of bombings and killings which occur every day in Asian capitals with large Islamic populations.

Western values are liberal, secular, selfish, profit-motivated values. This cultural anchor is what makes us better, and what conflicts intrinsically with Islamic values. Islamic values are based on control, sacrifice, and death. Death is the ultimate value to Islam. It is what suicide bombers create every day for themselves and dozens around them. Culturally, a society without central control and strict limits to freedom is impossible in an Islamic society. Donêt be confused by countries such as Indonesia or Bosnia, which have extensive liberty and trade in the midst of a huge –Islamic” population. Such nations as the latter are no more Islamic than Italy is Catholic. In nations where Western values are instituted and strong, religion is an affectation, not a culture. In the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa, religion is a culture, whose purpose is to control and dominate the individual from top to bottom.

Islam hates the West in every way. Its goal is our annihilation. There is no happy mid-way point. Partial annihilation is still annihilation, and indicates to Islam that their work is incomplete. This is why the foolish campaign to leave a –democratic” society in the wake of an invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan, or Palestine is doomed. Democracy in Islamic countries only results in the election of an Islamic regime, which will proceed to institute Islamic culture. Iran is a prime example. Women who are beaten on a daily basis accept this as part of their culture, and thus flock to the polls to cast their ballot for the authority that will keep it going. Democracy in Islamic nations is not synonymous with liberty as many Western politicians attempt to paint it ® it is merely a legitimating faÐade to maintain the status quo. Without liberty and capitalism as its foundation, democracy is useless. All illiberal democracy makes possible is the tyranny of the majority.

The goal of Western foreign and security policy today should be a swift and brutal demonstration of strength toward the Islamic world. Islamic terrorists bomb our city, we nuke one of theirs. Islamic states attempt to acquire and test weapons which can kill us, we lob bombs throughout all facilities across their state with any nuclear or long-range technology potential. We should not occupy our infantry with instituting a political order which will not make us more secure. We must end the states which sponsor terrorism and demonstrate our strength and willingness to use it.

Islamic culture does not value negotiation. Islamic negotiators take advantage of this civilized Western invention when it suits their purposes, but always view it as a sign of weakness, and an indicator that their policy of violence and death are effective. This is a lesson Israel has failed to learn despite decades of living at ground zero. Instead of keeping firm control over the territory and people they are capable of securing, Israel continues to give daily concessions to the Islamic terrorist organization which kills their citizens the same day. Just like America, which possesses massive remote military capabilities to crush our enemies without endangering a single infantry life instead chooses to deploy hundreds of thousands of infantry and watch as they are plucked off slowly by Islamic terrorists. Islamic terrorists donêt see our –noble” attempt at instituting political righteousness in their land as a symbol of friendship or reconciliation ® they only see that they are killing Americans and they are convinced that we are at the limit of our military power. We have made no show of force, we have merely occupied them. Only massive damage to their lives, infrastructure and environment will change this impression.

Lobbing nukes across the desert alone will not make us entirely secure ® no one would suggest that it would. But it will succeed in killing terrorists or potential terrorists and demonstrating the wrath of our retaliation should they choose to continue to kill Western citizens. In addition to ending states which sponsor terror, it is also important to maintain constant vigilance against infiltrating terrorists. They will always exist, no matter how humbled their homeland governments have been made (as demonstrated by the fact that a large share of terrorists attacking the West originate from the cowed and humbled Saudi Arabia).

To secure the West, we must prevent the blind eye which has consistently been focused on terrorist infiltrators for decades now. When British security forces stand on a subway platform and plead for their citizens to not see the fresh smoke below as the work of Islam, we are turning a blind eye. When the American president stands before America and tells us that Islam is a peaceful religion as our greatest cityês greatest buildings lay in rubble, we are turning a blind eye. We are failing to recognize the one thing these killers have in common: Islam. By failing to see Islam as the enemy, we are giving an immense advantage to the other team: they have seen liberty and capitalism as the enemy for hundreds of years, and every day reaffirm their devotion to violence in order to destroy these two values which make the West better than them.

Islamic profiling is not racial profiling. It is not the persecution of someone for the physical traits with which they were born, but the identification of a group whose values are killing us. Religious, political and social beliefs are something all individuals have the ability to choose, no matter how solidly their upbringing tells them they cannot. Just as our legal system does not allow convicted child molesters to be grammar school teachers, we must admit that involvement in or association with an Islamic organization is an indicator of potential violence against the West, and restrict such individuals appropriately. No innocent victims exist in such an environment. If the rules are made clear, every man and woman has the choice of living in the West as a Western citizen with Western values or as a pariah, or leaving the West for a place where their values are not at odds with those around them.

Our military is caught in a quagmire in Iraq: we are convinced we must –stay until the job is done”, meaning maintain an overwhelming military presence until we are convinced that Iraq is too free and capitalistic to be a threat. But that will never happen. The government we are allowing to be built there will never be built on Western values. Some say we should stay in atonement for invading a country which was not as much of a threat as we had originally perceived. This of course would be the worst sign of weakness and hypocrisy ever. Regardless of how exaggerated our perceptions of the security threat Iraq posed three years ago may have been, it was still a state which fostered and sponsored Islamic terrorists. Ending that state was the goal of our original campaign. It was achieved (albeit half-assed and impermanently) and we should leave.

We should prepare for the imminent new threats which are on the immediate horizon. Iran will have nuclear capabilities within months if new inspections are not permitted immediately. North Korea already has this capability. North Korea may not be Islamic, but it is run by a psychotic dictator who starves his people so that he can transfer nuclear technology to as many states as possible in order to undermine his enemies (real and perceived). Destroying North Korea would put a swift end to many of the nuclear ambitions of such states as Syria, Sudan, Algeria and Egypt. If our real concern is preventing a human tragedy, North Korea should be our primary concern. Eliminating its leader and destroying its government would necessarily be more difficult next door to free and Westernized South Korea, but the rewards would be great and the reunification of the peninsula (if executed properly) would be a boon for the world economy. It would also end a state which has the potential to drag the United States and China into an unnecessary conflict.

Iran already has nuclear capabilities, if any of Americaês or Israelês intelligence is even remotely correct. Itês merely a test and delivery device they continue to covet. Asking them to sign an agreement will not make a difference. –Restricting technology” never works. So long as a technology has a useful application, it will be used when available. For Islamic states such as Iran, that use is the death of Western citizens. If the West fails to stop Iran before it can properly test and transport nuclear weapons, we can expect nuclear terrorism to begin being as common in Europe as transit bombings, and even to spread to America if we fail to better equip and secure our domestic policing forces. Even if nuclear capabilities are further off for Iran than we presently assume, the fact that Iran has not changed its violent, anti-Western culture in three decades and continues to house some of the largest and most prolific terrorist training camps in the world is enough justification to show our muscle and end that state now. The only thing preventing our swift execution of such a mission is our preoccupation with democratizing Iraq and Afghanistan.

If the work is done in Iraq and Afghanistan, they are perfect staging grounds for the elimination of Iran. If the work is not done, then weêre doing something drastically wrong, and we must start doing it right on both fronts, in addition to doing the right thing with regard to Iran. We must end Islamic states. Destroy them, throw them into disarray. Destroy their military capabilities and kill their leaders. Make a true and unlimited demonstration of our ability to prevent them from destroying our freedom, prosperity and way of life. We must acknowledge that they are at fault and that their choice of cultural paradigm does not necessitate our friendship, charity or negotiation. If the latter is what they wanted, they could control their Islamic radicals better and do as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE and numerous other Islamist-populated states have done: help us with our security and eliminate the terrorists who are harming us. We do not require democracy abroad for security at home. We only require a firm personal affirmaation of the foundations and values which made the West the greatest civilization that ever was.